On Aug 14, 5:24*pm, John Smith wrote:
Derek C wrote:
On Aug 14, 11:30 am, John *wrote:
No, never! A cable brake is routine and *never* hazardous in *any*
circumstances. If it is, then something in your operation is seriously
flawed.

Depends on the size and nature of the airfield. Our site at Lasham in
the UK is large and flat, and gives you a wide range of options after
a winch launch failure. I have flown at a small sloping German site
where they launched without a weak link because having a weak link
failure was considered a serious hazard.

Hmmmmm... I've experienced firsthand a fair number of rope brakes on the
winch (but interestingly not a single weak link break), and hence
consider a rope break pretty much SOP when winching. So I'm not sure I'd
want to fly at that German site. I have no problem with an airfield
where a cable brake puts me in a difficult situation which requires
special procedures but a cable brake shall never be hazardous.

The site in question is a narrow strip 800 metres long, sloping
downhill at about 1 in 10, on top of a hill and totally surrounded by
small unlandable vineyards. They always launched downhill,
irrespective of wind direction. Once above about 200ft, but below
circuit height, the only cable break option to get back onto site was
a 180 degree turn (teardrop circuit) to land back uphill. The
alternatives were a controlled crash into a vineyard or a water
landing on the local river.

I have also winch launched at a very small UK site called Sandhill
Farm near Shrivenham in Wiltshire, which wasn't much better. At
certain heights you only option was to land in one of the surrounding
fields. They have since given up winch launching as they felt that the
risk to reward (700-800ft launches) ratio was too great.

The only problem with winch launching (of which I am a great fan) is
that you need a reasonable large airfield to get decent heights and to
do it safely without presenting pilots with extremely critical
judgement decisions in the event of a launch failure.

Derek C